Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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481. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if he will consider changing the situation where a person in receipt of the old age pension (contributory) and caring full-time for their spouse would get the full rate carer’s allowance instead of only half rate (currently the situation) due to the fact that they are receiving the contributory pension payment; the estimated cost of same; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13306/25]

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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The Irish social welfare system operates on a principle of "one person, one payment". People typically receive the highest payment they qualify for. However, there are a limited number of exceptions. In 2007, the half-rate Carer’s Allowance was introduced. This allows individuals receiving certain payments such as the State Pension (Contributory) to also receive a half-rate Carer’s Allowance, depending on their means. A person such as mentioned by the Deputy would receive a combined payment of €438.30 per week, compared with €298 per week for Carer's Allowance alone.

In relation to costing, at the end of February there were 10,933 recipients of the half-rate Carer’s Allowance payment who were also in receipt of the weekly State Pension Contributory payment. Of these some 7,430 were caring for a spouse or a cohabitant. The cost of extending a full-rate Carer’s Allowance payment to this cohort is estimated at an additional €57.5 million per year. This costing does not take account of persons in receipt of a State Pension who are caring for a child or someone other than a spouse.

The Programme for Government; Securing Ireland’s Future includes a commitment to ensure that parents who are aged 66 or older and caring for children with lifelong disabilities retain the rate at which they are paid their Carer’s Allowance and concurrently receive the State Pension.

Any further changes such as those suggested by the Deputy would have implications for overall spending and could only be addressed in an overall budgetary and policy context.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.